It seems like everyone uses this variant rule.
To the point that it's maybe more common than even allowing the human ancestry. ;)
So I'm kind of wondering if there is anyone out there that doesn't use it.
If they don't, why did they make that choice? How have things turned out? And how did players who were aware of the variant react to not having it?
I've seen a lot of recommendations to use it, but I've yet to ever encounter the counter opinion. So I'm curious to see if I can find anyone willing to either defend not using, or just state how it went in trying to run a campaign (something long enough for the difference to matter) without it.
I'm "on the fence" for how I will approach it when I finally start my own game. But I've only seen one side of the debate so far.
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Pathfinder Society games don't use it.
The other valid arguments against it that I have seen:
* It is more complex for new players and can cause information overload.
* It can cause a lot of overlap in characters if there are a lot of characters in the party.
I have also seen an argument that it causes overpowered characters, but I don't really believe that. The same power combo characters can generally be built with just the normal archetype rules.
Personally I find it to be a privilege to be allowed to use Free Archetype in a game that I join. Not an expectation. So if a GM wants to not run with it for whatever reason, I don't really mind.
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I'm running without Free Archetype, since my players are all fairly new to the system. I didn't want to overload them with more feats as they're already having difficulty with the number of choices. Maybe in the future, but I'm souring more and more on Free Archetype the longer I think about it.
If I used it in the future, I would probably restrict it to a handful of options that fit the theme of the campaign. Maybe replace unlocking the ability to take an archetype in an adventure path with just automatically gaining it as a free archetype. (Abomination Vaults has a couple unique archetypes, for example, one of which is very skill-focused and not all that useful, and one of which is unlocked at level 8 of a 10-level adventure.)
There are a lot of flavorful archetypes that will just never get used, even in a Free Archetype game. The fighting style, Marshal, or Medic archetypes are just much more mechanically useful than "you are a Pirate."
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There are a lot of flavorful archetypes that will just never get used
One of the issues with "flavorful" options is that they just have gaps in the archetype without any feats when you get free ones with free archetype or having a VERY limited options for the levels that do have feats. For instance, Pirate and Turpin Rowe Lumberjack together do not have enough feats to take all your free archetype feats.
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I ran a non-free-archetype game to get my group used to the system, then we quickly went over to all free archetype all the time. Even my player who was brand new to TTRPGs had no issues making the switch.
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I've seen a few GMs not using it, myself included. And the players just don't care, they follow the GM guidelines.
I really don't understand the point of this discussion.
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Strength of Thousands requires the use of Free Archetype, unless everyone wants to play as a wizard or druid. Not a good example here.
Free Archetype is fun, but playing without it is just as fun. Its a different type of challenge to play a game with less available options.
It depends from my players.
In one table I don't use because there are some players in this table that don't like to do too much complex builds (they don't like to search for feats too frequently) and are more rules conservative.
In another table full of "power players" I use it with Ancestry Paragon to give to players more flexibility.
And in my 3rd and most newest table I choose to use some house-rules instead. I use an every level class feat variant (that I call as Class Paragon) giving a new class feat every level instead. This currently is giving some interesting interactions and builds.
The mostly interesting aspect of last 2 is that give more feats may increases some players' powers (yet there's some ways getting rage, precision damage and some spells via archetypes) but mostly players choose to have more versatility (like the barbarian getting some Wrestler dedication and feats to grapple at same time he's still investing into barbarian feats) to have different options during the game instead of focus into power creep.
My current campaign began in October 2019, before the PF2 Gamemastery Guide and its variant rules were published. Therefore, we had no Free Archetype.
That campaign should end this summer. We are playing from 1st level to 20th level and at 18th level right now. But I am considering trying Starfinder as my next campaign, so afterwards still no Free Archetype.
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I don't run with it, I did for extinction curse and disliked how much power discrepency it added to the game in the mid levels between players who optimize and those who don't.
I much prefer the game without free archetypes and instead I will reward people with a free dedication feat if roleplay and downtime lead to it.
I likely won't run with it again unless it is restricted for thematics.
My players seem to like my games and I don't have them fizzle out early, so how my players react... well I guess that is enough.
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I would usually not use it, because I like that every character has a bit of niche where the spotlight is for them. For the same reason I'd put the max group size at 4-5.
Cases where I'd consider it:
- A 2-player campaign, I might even go dual class. It'd probably be still more of a stealth/heist kind of campaign since the party has to be super wary of taking on superior enemy numbers.
- A 3-player campaign, where free archetype might be just enough extra versatility to make it work perfectly.
- A highly thematic campaign like Strength of Thousands, where everyone should have some theme-related abilities and so everyone gets them.
I've thought about doing a monk school themed campaign in Quain with a lot of Three Musketeers flavor in it, where the PCs are representatives of major schools, of course all super proud of their particular styles yadda yadda. Everyone is either a monk with a free other archetype, or some other class with a free monk archetype.
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As far as my group is concerned, FA should have been the standard rule. We use it to better express themes without taxing the cost of core feats to the class. I’ve also played with online communities that use FA and it never caused any issues with power balance.
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Good to see a lot of perspectives that differ from what I'm used to seeing get recommended from assorted YouTube, Discord, and other sources.
Lots of food for thought there and I feel less "pressured" now to just "go with the flow" and use it. ;)
I have no idea what I will do in the end. But I have more to think on now and for that's always a good thing.
Just ask your players about it.
As already pointed Free Archetype doesn't give a significant power boost it's basically improves the build's versatility. So if your players constantly missing slots to do what they want to do with their builds they may like the FA if not they may not care about it or even feel pressed to choose an archetype.
Talk with your players is always the best option in these cases.
I'm using it in my three player AoA game, but only two people are actually using it. The kobold cleric of Apsu went Dragon Disciple, and the Hell Knight fighter went Hell Knight. The wizard didn't use it at all.
In future games, I may or may not use it. It would depend on what I felt was right for that game, and for the players' concepts. It would also depend on what archetypes were new in that AP, and if they interested any of the players.
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I think it does add extra power. I mean, someone with a FA simply has more than someone without FA. And there are enough things you can get with FA that result in "tall" upgrades, it's not all about "wide" extra alternative options.
It's a bit hard to quantify just how much extra power though. Rogue archetype is in a very different league than archaeologist archetype for example. One of them gives you extra languages and some skills. The other one gives you multiple ways of easily getting enemies flat-footed, and sneak attack damage.
Overall I'd say the boost from the stronger archetypes is around half a level, to a whole level for really high synergy choices.
That could be a reason to choose to use FA actually. If you find that the baseline game is just an inch too much biased against the players, the standard difficulty juuuust a bit higher than you enjoy. Well, then FA might be exactly the extra scoop of power to add to the PCs to get a much more satisfying campaign.
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I think it does add extra power. I mean, someone with a FA simply has more than someone without FA. And there are enough things you can get with FA that result in "tall" upgrades, it's not all about "wide" extra alternative options.
But is it the 'Free' part of Free Archetype that adds that, or is it the 'Archetype' part?
Because all of the power boosting synergies that I have ever seen anyone post can be built without Free Archetype - just at the expense of the less important class feats.
Usually it is a synergy between a class feature and an archetype ability. Like a Rogue with Monk archetype to get Sneak Attack with Flurry of Blows on a d8 Agile, Finesse unarmed attack.
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I'm not a fan of the way this question is asked, because it presupposes that the default should be using the Free Archetype rule, which is of course not the baseline. The baseline isn't using it.
The question shouldn't be "why don't you use it?" I think the standard answer should be "because the base rules don't include it". Although there might be additional reasons why someone would never consider using it. Rather the question should be "why do you think everyone should use the Free Archetype rule?".
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I think it does add extra power. I mean, someone with a FA simply has more than someone without FA. And there are enough things you can get with FA that result in "tall" upgrades, it's not all about "wide" extra alternative options.But is it the 'Free' part of Free Archetype that adds that, or is it the 'Archetype' part?
Because all of the power boosting synergies that I have ever seen anyone post can be built without Free Archetype - just at the expense of the less important class feats.
Usually it is a synergy between a class feature and an archetype ability. Like a Rogue with Monk archetype to get Sneak Attack with Flurry of Blows on a d8 Agile, Finesse unarmed attack.
For some builds, those "less important class feats" are still kind of a big deal. Sure, there are classes who can probably scrounge enough spare class feats together to get what they're looking for without carving too much out of their base class... and there are others that cannot. I regularly wind up with builds where I want to spend more base class feats than I have, and would still be interested in archetype feats.
I mean, isn't that kind of the point of FA? It lets you play around with archetype goodies without taking from your main class.
So yeah - it's a power upgrade, and it's one that does a lot more for people who are optimizing with it than for people who are just building whatever.
I think it does add extra power. I mean, someone with a FA simply has more than someone without FA. And there are enough things you can get with FA that result in "tall" upgrades, it's not all about "wide" extra alternative options.But is it the 'Free' part of Free Archetype that adds that, or is it the 'Archetype' part?
Because all of the power boosting synergies that I have ever seen anyone post can be built without Free Archetype - just at the expense of the less important class feats.
Usually it is a synergy between a class feature and an archetype ability. Like a Rogue with Monk archetype to get Sneak Attack with Flurry of Blows on a d8 Agile, Finesse unarmed attack.
Fighter + Druid + Martial Artist + Monk + Alchemist = highest melee damage dealer in the game. Summoner + Rogue + Investigator + Swashbuckler/Bard = best skill monkey in the game. And there are many like that where combining so many archetypes breaks the ceiling without affecting your main build much (and as such is a clear power boost).
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Is that fighter for legendary weapon proficiency?
Martial artist to progress unarmed proficiency to legendary?
Druid to wild shape into things with "big attacks"?
And alchemist for easy access to self buffing items?
Can you really even get everything you want? Even with free archetype? And what about the restriction of taking two class feats before multiclassing again?
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Is that fighter for legendary weapon proficiency?
Martial artist to progress unarmed proficiency to legendary?
Druid to wild shape into things with "big attacks"?
And alchemist for easy access to self buffing items?Can you really even get everything you want? Even with free archetype? And what about the restriction of taking two class feats before multiclassing again?
Alchemist is because at level 16+ this build is better without Wild Shape but with Feral Mutagen instead. But at levels up to 10, Wild Shaping for an extra +2 above the Fighter bonus is also way too strong. So you can be super efficient during most levels.
You have 23 (25 if human) feats with free archetypes, it's just 4 Archetypes, so you can easily get what you want. Without FA, on the other hand, it's much more troublesome and asks for a ton of retraining during your career if you don't want too many dead levels.
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Same for skill monkey. What's the part of free archetype that makes a char more skill monkey than int rogues already are? You still have the MADness of many different atribute skills. I honestly don't see how could you make a stronger skill creep here.
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Same for skill monkey. What's the part of free archetype that makes a char more skill monkey than int rogues already are? You still have the MADness of many different atribute skills. I honestly don't see how could you make a stronger skill creep here.
There are a few archetypes that grant auto-scaling skill increases, either with the dedication itself (Acrobat Dedication) or as an archetype feat (Brilliant Crafter for the multiclass inventor archetype). Stack them on top of a rogue base class and you can have legendary proficiency in up to nine skills at 20th level.
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Fighter + Druid + Martial Artist + Monk + Alchemist = highest melee damage dealer in the game. Summoner + Rogue + Investigator + Swashbuckler/Bard = best skill monkey in the game. And there are many like that where combining so many archetypes breaks the ceiling without affecting your main build much (and as such is a clear power boost).I think it does add extra power. I mean, someone with a FA simply has more than someone without FA. And there are enough things you can get with FA that result in "tall" upgrades, it's not all about "wide" extra alternative options.But is it the 'Free' part of Free Archetype that adds that, or is it the 'Archetype' part?
Because all of the power boosting synergies that I have ever seen anyone post can be built without Free Archetype - just at the expense of the less important class feats.
Usually it is a synergy between a class feature and an archetype ability. Like a Rogue with Monk archetype to get Sneak Attack with Flurry of Blows on a d8 Agile, Finesse unarmed attack.
Given the requirement almost every archetype has of taking two additional feats before being allowed a new dedication makes these supposed power builds seem rather moot.
As a GM I don't use it. My Extinction Curse players (all 20 of them across multiple tables) are having a blast and doing just fine without.
As a player, I've played with and without it. Both are great fun.
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Same for skill monkey. What's the part of free archetype that makes a char more skill monkey than int rogues already are? You still have the MADness of many different atribute skills. I honestly don't see how could you make a stronger skill creep here.
Not at all. If you play a Summoner, you can choose Dex and Charisma that you'll raise to 24, and Strength, Intelligence and Wisdom that you'll raise to 20. With One for All or Inspire Competence you can Aid yourself (your Eidolon who has the same skills than you) for a +4 to many skill checks. And you can take Rogue and Investigator Archetype for 3 Legendary skills and 10 Master skills (and also Acrobat or Inventor to get more Legendary skills).
Given the requirement almost every archetype has of taking two additional feats before being allowed a new dedication makes these supposed power builds seem rather moot.
Why would they? The only Archetype that is causing issue is Martial Artist. Monk gives you 2 insteresting feats (Flurry of Blows and Ki Strike), you need 5 Alchemists feats, at least 2 Druid feats. So you don't lose that many feats. And I don't think you have ever looked at the damage this build does.
My group hasn't used it the few times we played PF2e because the players wanted to escape the purgatory that is chargen ASAP.
Given the requirement almost every archetype has of taking two additional feats before being allowed a new dedication makes these supposed power builds seem rather moot.Why would they? The only Archetype that is causing issue is Martial Artist. Monk gives you 2 insteresting feats (Flurry of Blows and Ki Strike), you need 5 Alchemists feats, at least 2 Druid feats. So you don't lose that many feats. And I don't think you have ever looked at the damage this build does.
That’s 11 feats alone including dedications. I really don’t care how much damage potential that build would have as it wouldn’t be until level 20 that it could even play.
This seems like a meaningless concern of creating OP characters as most players never even see level 20 nonetheless play as one.
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No, this build deals crazy damage from level 4 to 20. There are ups and downs, but overall it's a build that breaks the ceiling. And you can't do that without FA.
One of my players has asked about the Free Archetype variant, but I've yet to allow it in my games. Currently play with ABP and Ancestry Paragon.
For me, this is for the following reasons:
Currently planning to run Strength of Thousands after my current campaign, so thinking may change once I see how my players react. That said, I'm currently very hopeful that PCs will see it as interesting to have a limited Free Archetype (Druid/Wizard) without being annoyed that it is limited.
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No, this build deals crazy damage from level 4 to 20. There are ups and downs, but overall it's a build that breaks the ceiling. And you can't do that without FA.
If it could be done by level 4, then it can be done without FA.
Frankly, I highly doubt the “crazy damage” that “breaks the ceiling” even with FA.
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No, this build deals crazy damage from level 4 to 20. There are ups and downs, but overall it's a build that breaks the ceiling. And you can't do that without FA.If it could be done by level 4, then it can be done without FA.
Frankly, I highly doubt the “crazy damage” that “breaks the ceiling” even with FA.
Nope.
At low level, you combine Wild Shape +2 status to attack + Fighter high chances to hit to get the highest chances to hit at low level. The issue is that at level 5 you get Master proficiency in a single type of weapon and Wild Shape attacks are untyped, so you need Martial Artist Dedication to apply your Master Proficiency to your attacks, which is possible at level 6 with FA, and only 8 without it. But Wild Shape is mostly interesting at levels 4-10, after that it goes down. So with FA it's playable, without not really.Then you have the Mutagenist build, that is the highest melee martial damage dealer at high level (16+).
At level 11-15, you can switch between both builds, the Druid one for sustained damage, the Mutagenist one for tough fights as it costs you a consumable at these levels.
Overall, this build only exists with FA. And it's certainly not the only one, as I've not tried to find all possible powergaming builds with FA.
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LOL!!! A level 4 fighter with a +1 striking weapon has a +13 to hit and will be down to at best a +11 in animal form. That same fighter could have a 18+ level (AC 22), but is at AC 16+ level with animal form. I don’t know what extra math you add to this, but that fighter is nerfing themself with this build. Those numbers continue to be against the fighter as the form is leveled.
Edit: Rereading Wild Shape, it appears the status bonus is in addition to the current character’s to-hit. With that, then the bonus could be construed to a +15 which is better. That said, meh anyway as the lack of options to a character in battle forms is already an issue.
Also, as a GM if one of my players did this build, they would either be far too young to play with us, or are going to be the first to go down due to an overconfidence in design. A GM doesn’t have to work hard at all to have monsters find a build like that anything more than cute.
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Ok...
At least, read the rules.
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No, this build deals crazy damage from level 4 to 20. There are ups and downs, but overall it's a build that breaks the ceiling. And you can't do that without FA.If it could be done by level 4, then it can be done without FA.
Frankly, I highly doubt the “crazy damage” that “breaks the ceiling” even with FA.
Nope.
At low level, you combine Wild Shape +2 status to attack + Fighter high chances to hit to get the highest chances to hit at low level. The issue is that at level 5 you get Master proficiency in a single type of weapon and Wild Shape attacks are untyped, so you need Martial Artist Dedication to apply your Master Proficiency to your attacks, which is possible at level 6 with FA, and only 8 without it. But Wild Shape is mostly interesting at levels 4-10, after that it goes down. So with FA it's playable, without not really.
Then you have the Mutagenist build, that is the highest melee martial damage dealer at high level (16+).
At level 11-15, you can switch between both builds, the Druid one for sustained damage, the Mutagenist one for tough fights as it costs you a consumable at these levels.Overall, this build only exists with FA. And it's certainly not the only one, as I've not tried to find all possible powergaming builds with FA.
Just a small note that Ape has the Fist unarmed attack, which belongs to the Brawling group. So Wild Shaping into an Ape would work from level 5 on if I am not mistaken.
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I'm slowly starting to trend my opinion away from the Free Archetype rule.
A few days ago on the "Knights of Last Call" stream, he noted his opinion of it going from being for it to against it over time.
At 1:42:00 in:
https://www.youtube.com/live/e4ukRoR9NUs?feature=share&t=6146
With Free Archetype, the party starts to have a lot of overlap if they at all take things for effectiveness.
This comment that pops in right as the timer goes to 1:45:00 is very illustrating of the problem: "FA really exacerbates the problem of every class being done better as a fighter multiclass". That comment came in right after he noted that in a high level game his fighter had 18 spell slots thanks to free archetypes and that as a result of FA, by high level everyone in the party has found some path to looking similar. Everyone is a champion sorcerer fighter combo of some kind. Without FA, to get there you have to give something up, so people remain distinct.
At 1:54:00 he notes that at low level you can feel you don't have enough stuff to do - which drives the pressure for the free archetype rule. He prefers the game start in the mid levels (and this is where I break ranks with him) to avoid this problem. I think he feels that FA fixes low level at the cost of breaking high level - and I suspect he's right other than I myself not feeling low level needs fixing.
So while I'm now trending away from wanting to use Free Archetype, I'm still left with 'will I have players unhappy if I reject using it'.
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With Free Archetype, the party starts to have a lot of overlap if they at all take things for effectiveness.
Yeah that's my take too. That's why I'd consider FA for a 3-player campaign, because then the party tends to be a bit thin on covering all bases at least once. (And for a 2-player campaign I'd consider dual class for the same reason.)
At 1:54:00 he notes that at low level you can feel you don't have enough stuff to do - which drives the pressure for the free archetype rule. He prefers the game start in the mid levels (and this is where I break ranks with him) to avoid this problem. I think he feels that FA fixes low level at the cost of breaking high level - and I suspect he's right other than I myself not feeling low level needs fixing.
I think this varies a bit by class. Especially with the newer classes I don't have the feeling that I don't have enough to do. A thaumaturge for example is naturally driven to high charisma so on top of using your special class abilities and just plain fighting, you also have demoralize, feint, bon mot.
Also for some classes you pretty much automatically get enough to do. A magus is never going to feel that they have more actions than they know what to do with. Spellstrike, recharching spell strike, activating arcane cascade, moving around, is already eating up all your actions. Good luck finding time to recall knowledge. The magus is a harried office worker who doesn't have time to strategize :P
But for a barbarian, after you've raged, it can feel like you're often having a third action that's a bit spare. You don't use agile weapons so MAP bites, you probably use a 2H weapon so you're not raising a shield. At that point, you only have a cool third action if you planned ahead to have one. You had to plan ahead to take Raging Intimidation so you can Demoralize. Or take Moment of Clarity for other mental actions. And your class chassis didn't force you to take a good mental stat, you had to plan that yourself.
I've allowed a curated list of archetypes that spice up the campaign theme with options we don't often see.
For example I'm running an all-kobold game and they got to choose from archetypes like Artillerist, Dandy, Scout, Scrounger, Snarecrafter, and Trapsmith.
This is far more interesting than the umteenth multiclass, marshal, dandy, medic, beastmaster, blessed one.
On the player side I consider FA the exception, not the rule. I always push myself to choose "weaker" options to build unique characters rather than something copied from an optimization guide.
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My current campaign began in October 2019, before the PF2 Gamemastery Guide and its variant rules were published. Therefore, we had no Free Archetype.
That campaign should end this summer. We are playing from 1st level to 20th level and at 18th level right now. But I am considering trying Starfinder as my next campaign, so afterwards still no Free Archetype.
Hey, head's up! Thurston Hillman on a podcast confirmed that Starfinder Enhanced will have some variant rules in there, including Free Archetype! They noted how popular it was in PF2E, and so decided to include it as a new variant rule for SF.
I dont use it because my campaign started before the Gamemastery Guide was released. We're just about to finish book four of Age of Ashes and have had no issues not using this "must have" optional rule.
With Free Archetype, the party starts to have a lot of overlap if they at all take things for effectiveness.Yeah that's my take too. That's why I'd consider FA for a 3-player campaign, because then the party tends to be a bit thin on covering all bases at least once.
If that is a problem that you are seeing in larger groups, I would also recommend the variation that you only get the level 2, 4, 6 archetype slots. Any others that you want you have to spend your actual class feats on.
That still allows the quick customization and differentiation between characters, but still keeps the tradeoffs of class feats for archetype feats at higher levels to avoid that uniform optimization of all of the characters.
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I don't use it unless the campaign calls for it. I'm not giving my players a free feat just because they saw it in the GMG and now they want it.
I'm actually using it for the first time in my next game. I'm running Skull & Shackles using the current rules. So I made a list of archetypes that fit with a pirate theme that they can choose from.
How did they react in prior games? They asked if they could have a free archetype and I said no. That was the end.